Highlights:

The Indian economy was largely driven by domestic consumption, with activity across the industry and services sectors in expansion mode. However, the synchronized tightening of policy rates by global central banks, has been slowing down global demand and international trade.

The new vehicle sales continued to deliver strong growth year on year for private car segment, with continued momentum in the underlying insurance demand, the Commercial vehicle segment growth was supported by robust growth in end user industries, while the two wheeler segment grew on a smaller base but continues to remain below pre- pandemic levels.

Health insurance, continued to drive the overall industry growth.

The commercial lines witnessed growth in line with the current market environment.

The company remains optimistic that the insurance industry will continue to grow given the low penetration, favorable regulatory changes and positive consumer sentiment.

The general insurance industry recorded 16% growth in the Gross Direct Premium Income (GDPI) for 9MFY2023. Excluding crop, the growth was 17.5% for the same period.

The industry underwriting performance remained poor, with the combined ratio of the industry at 116.6% in H1FY2023. For Motor business, Combined Ratio for the industry was 123.5% in H1FY2023 as compared to 110.4% in H1FY2022.

The regulatory authority in current financial year, has introduced various reforms seeking to expand the market and increase the penetration of insurance products towards mission of “Insurance for all by 2047”.

The GDPI of Company grew by 16.9% in Q3FY2023 as compared to the industry growth of 18.1%. Excluding crop, the Company grew by 17.1%.

In Motor, growth remained muted at 4.7%. The competitive intensity continued on the Motor OD side especially on the Private Car segment.

The company continued to focus on profitable sub segments using historical granular data and rebalanced its portfolio resulting in CV mix at 22.2% for 9MFY2023

Health segment continued to be the fastest growing segment for the industry. During the quarter, the company grew at 47.9%, which was significantly higher than the industry growth of 24.9%.

With continued investments in Retail Health distribution, the company has outgrown the industry and standalone players with a growth of 24.2%, driven by business sourced through retail health agency vertical which grew at 40.1%.

The company expects expense ratio to remain elevated as investments in retail health and digitalization continues. The completion of technology migration of Bharti AXA business is expected to provide synergy benefits.

Bancassurance and key relationship groups grew at 39.3% in Q3FY2023. Within this ICICI Bank distribution grew by 30.9% and non-ICICI Bank distribution grew by 44.2%.

Business sourced through Digital One team grew by 28.3%

Overall, digital focus has enabled to increase digital revenues to Rs 262 crore which accounts for 4.8% of overall GDPI for the quarter.

As far as the commercial lines are concerned, the company has experienced robust growth, driven by growth of 25.2% in the SME segment.

The company remains on track and focused on growth levers such as innovation, digital advancements, launching new products, strengthening distribution engine, rationalising cost while scaling up preferred lines of business.

The agents (including Point of sale or POS) count, was at 106,119 end December 2022, from 100,636 end September 2022.

The combined ratio was 104.6% in 9MFY2023 as against 111.0% in 9MFY2022. Combined ratio was 104.4% in Q3FY2023 as against 104.5% in Q3FY2022.

The company expects combined ratio to improve from FY24 leading to higher RoEs.